Political, Administrative and Economic Unification of the Country

The British rule in the Indian subcontinent extended from the Himalayas in the north to the Cape Comorin in the south and from Assam in the east to Khyber Pass in the west. While large areas of India had been brought under a single rule in the past—under the Mauryas or later under the Mughals— the British created a larger state than that of the Mauryas or the great Mughals. While Indian provinces were under ‘direct’ British rule, the princely states were under ‘indirect’ British rule. The British sword imposed political unity in India. A professional civil service, a unified judiciary and codified civil and criminal laws throughout the length and breadth of the country imparted a new dimension of political unity to the hitherto cultural unity that had existed in India for centuries. The necessities of administrative convenience, considerations of military defence and the urge for economic penetration and commercial exploitation (all in British interests) were the driving forces behind the planned development of modern means of transport and communication such as railways, roads, electricity and telegraph.

From the nationalists’ point of view, this process of unification had a two-fold effect:

(i) The economic fate of the people of different regions got linked together; for instance, failure of crops in one region affected the prices and supply in another region.

(ii) Modern means of transport and communication brought people, especially the leaders, from different regions together. This was important for the exchange of political ideas and for mobilisation and organisation of public opinion on political and economic issues.